If you had to pick the strongest Dao-son out of the Nanhong Seven, there might be no end of argument about it.

But if you had to pick the proudest, that was Su Hongxiu and nobody else.

At this moment the Heaven-Sword Dao-son stood among the clouds with her hands cupped, her eyes lifted to that ink-robed figure at the top of the long stair.

There was a blade's edge in her eyes, and it wavered a little; her gaze came slowly to rest on that bridge of purple jade.

"Whew."

It was a long while before Su Hongxiu's red lips parted at last and she breathed out — and it still did not clear all the shock at the bottom of her heart.

A great part of the pride she had carried all her life came from the road she had walked herself, a road of Return-to-Void that could be called very nearly perfect.

Only nearly, and for a reason—

there was a precedent in Nanhong before her: Senior Xuanqing of the Nanyang Sect, who even at the ninth layer of Return-to-Void still had the strength to forge a Supreme Heavenly Palace.

By comparison Su Hongxiu fell one story short.

But Li Xuanqing was a prodigy of ages long past. It had not been his era for a very long time, and even the tales that had once shaken the world were sinking by degrees into the long river of time.

She was not about to be affected by a figure out of hearsay.

And yet here, now, a purple-qi rainbow bridge that could be called perfect in the true sense of the word had appeared in front of her without the least warning.

It genuinely left Su Hongxiu unable to gather herself for a while.

Fortunately she was not the only one wearing that expression. The minds of every cultivator present were sunk into that purple rainbow, and could not pull free of it.

"What's the matter with you?"

Su Hongxiu suddenly noticed that the pretty girl beside her seemed different from everyone else.

By ordinary reckoning, a…